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Star columnist Jim Travers, 'a good friend and great journalist'

OTTAWA—James Travers, an award-winning national columnist and former executive managing editor for the Toronto Star, has died.

Travers, 62, died from complications following surgery on his spleen.

Jim Travers was an award-winning national columnist and former executive managing editor for the Toronto Star. (BERNARD WEIL / TORONTO STAR FILE PHOTO)

“Jim was a first-rate friend of many years and a journalist I enormously admired,” said Star publisher John Cruickshank.

Irreverent, passionate and with a sense of humour worthy of a comedy star, Travers was a larger-than-life figure who excelled as a foreign correspondent, editor and columnist.

Travers, known universally as Jim, rose to become one of the country’s most respected media voices during nearly 40 years at the forefront of Canadian journalism.

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A national affairs columnist in Ottawa for the Star since 1999, his career was capped last year when he won a National Newspaper Award for political writing. .

“We were all hugely proud of his National Newspaper Award last year. It gave him the recognition his body of work deserved,” said Cruickshank.

Travers joined the Star in 1997 and led the newspaper for two years until he returned to political writing in the paper’s Ottawa bureau.

Torstar chairman John Honderich, who as publisher brought Travers to the Star, said, “Jim was a superb journalist. His love of the craft, his dedication to quality journalism, and his powerful and intelligent Ottawa column were all testament to the essence of Jim Travers.

“This is a loss for Canadian journalism.”

Star editor Michael Cooke also mourned the silencing of a strong and respected voice on national affairs.

“If you spent any time with Jim you learned something about journalism and truth and about life. Jim took his work so very seriously, but never did that with himself. He’ll be missed for his wisdom, his humour and his kindness,” Cooke said.

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Prime Minister Stephen Harper took time from a news conference in Toronto to recognize Travers’ death, a testament to the influence and reach of his writing.

“I actually just finished writing a get-well letter to him last night so I’m certainly aware that his passing is very unexpected and very tragic,” Harper said.

“Jim Travers was a fixture on Parliament Hill. He was a journalist who was well-regarded and certainly well-loved,” said Harper, whose office issued a formal statement to mourn his death.

As the sad news went out Thursday, the tributes poured in from politicians and journalists alike who expressed grief at the loss of a cherished writer.

In the House of Commons, MPs rose to remember “a good friend, a fine Canadian and a great journalist.”

“Jim was a true gentleman whose rumpled presence concealed a sharp mind, a lovely sense of fun and a great pen,” said Liberal MP Bob Rae.

An emotional Rae broke down several times during his remarks, pausing at one point to collect himself and quipping that Travers would have been annoyed at his inability to get through the speech without crying.

“We will all miss his keen mind and shrewd analysis, but even more, we will miss the warmth and kindness he showed to so many of us,” Rae said.

“He had a deep love of our country and a profound respect for the importance of our democratic institutions and traditions,” he said.

NDP MP Pat Martin said Travers was an “inspiration and a mentor” to many in his field.

“He was an old-school guy who would never burn a source, never pull a punch and never hesitate to speak truth to power in the finest tradition of his honourable craft ... The man could really write,” Martin said.

Martin, who often bumped into Travers at lunch in the West Block parliamentary cafeteria, said the columnist represented the “very best of journalistic integrity.”

Born in Hamilton, Travers began his writing career at the Oakville Journal Record in the early 1970s after graduating from the University of Guelph with an arts degree. After four years at the Hamilton Spectator, he joined Southam News, covering Toronto and Ottawa before being posted to Africa in 1982 and, three years later, the Middle East.

He witnessed some of the most tumultuous, and dangerous, events of that era in Africa and the Middle East, dodging Beirut’s indiscriminate violence during Lebanon’s civil strife and surviving trench battles during the Iraq-Iran war.

In the late 1980s, Travers returned to Canada to run the Southam News agency, quickly achieving a reputation as an imaginative, motivational editor who knew how to bring out the best in his reporters.

“He was one of the best editors I ever worked with,” said Juliet O’Neill, a former foreign correspondent who worked in Washington, Moscow and London for Southam News.

“When I was in Moscow he always made my day with a laugh. ‘When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping.’ As if there was shopping in Moscow,” O’Neill said.

Travers was editor of the Ottawa Citizen from 1991 to 1996 after he resigned in a split with Hollinger Corp., the newspaper owners controlled by Conrad Black. In 1997, he became executive managing editor of the Star.

“His succinct turn of phrase, sharp analytical skills and measured approach to his subjects were greatly admired by his followers and colleagues,” Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff said in a statement.

He and his “must-read” column “will be deeply missed,” he said.

“Shocked and heartbroken to hear news of Jim Travers’ passing,” Green Party Leader Elizabeth May posted on Twitter.

“A fine, decent man. Integrity breathed through his pores.”

Truly a man for all seasons, Travers was a dedicated father and husband, an avid traveller, fanatical cyclist, unassuming intellectual and faithful friend. He never stopped trying to perfect the writing craft, and his commitment to democracy, human rights and fairness in Canada and around the world never wavered.

Star reporter Tonda MacCharles recalls speaking with Travers the night before she and her husband headed overseas to adopt a daughter.

“You’re very brave,” she remembers Travers saying.

“I told him I wasn’t brave at all — that I was terrified,” MacCharles recalls.

With a dad as a roving foreign correspondent, sons Patrick and Ben got a unique taste of the world that would later help shape their careers.

Indeed, Travers described how he and wife Joan happened to be in New York City at the same time as Patrick, an employee of the Canadian mission, was unexpectedly tasked with addressing the United Nations General Assembly because Canada’s ambassador at the UN mission had to be away at the time.

The couple was able to watch Patrick address the world forum. Travers later chuckled that the place was half-empty as usual. But he beamed when he spoke of his sons’ love of travel and intellectual curiosity about global affairs.

Travers’ exploits in global hotspots made him a source of wise advice for reporters as they made their own plans to cover the world. Before Star reporter and office colleague Joanna Smith headed out recently to cover unrest in the Middle East, he made clear to call anytime, day or night, if anything happened or she got in a tight spot.

“I mean it. I know some people,” said Travers, who covered the Middle East for Southam News between 1985 and 1988 and kept impressive and high-level diplomatic contacts.

His self-deprecating humour never left him, even when he faced surgery on his spleen two weeks ago. He told longtime friend and colleague Peter Calamai that in future he would note on his writing: “This column written without spleen.”

“He told me, ‘You can write. And you can think. And what else do you need in this business?’

“He was without doubt made for journalism. He was hilarious, mischievous, witty, curious, courageous and constantly bemused by humanity’s folly.

“Whenever any of us would grouse about the business — and he’d do his share — he’d say, ‘Yeah, but look at the life we’ve had.’”

That was echoed by Star columnist Chantal Hébert, who shared the national affairs file with Travers.

“Jim was the most generous sounding board a fellow columnist could wish for, but more than that someone who loved journalism for all of the right reasons,” Hébert said.

In addition to his NNA, Travers was also honoured in 2005 with the Charles Lynch Award, handed out by the National Press Club.

As a columnist, he cultivated high-level sources from the worlds of foreign affairs, defence and finance, and over sushi lunches in ByWard Market held wide-ranging discussions on the issues of the day.

“He won the trust and confidence of those who rarely ever talk to journalists: senior public servants and those who work in the secret world of intelligence and security,” said Graham Fraser, Ottawa’s Commissioner of Official Languages and a former colleague at the Star’s Ottawa bureau.

“At the same time, he spent a great deal of time and effort on the craft of writing; his columns were invariably extremely well-written,” Fraser said.

Tim Harper, the Star’s national editor, highlighted Travers’ work ethic that often had him tweaking a single word in a column right up to deadline.

“I’ve never met anyone more dedicated to his craft,” Harper said.

Indeed, Travers wrote right up until the night before his surgery. His last column appeared while he was in hospital.

Journalists, politicians and readers poured out their sorrow at his death onto Twitter.

“The Parliamentary Press Gallery has lost one of the best, both a great journo and great person,” wrote Jennifer Ditchburn, a director of the Parliamentary Press Gallery.

Travers leaves his wife, Joan, and sons Patrick and Ben. The family is asking that in lieu of flowers, donations be made to the Canadian Cancer Society.

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